Why would any elite want such a mass in the first place? Wouldn't they be much better off without any such a liability?

The only possible use I can see of any Metaverse or any direct internet brain link is to decouple, distracting people from procreating.

Bringing down the world's population levels from soon 10bln back down to the 1950s level of 2,5bln or, even better, down to about 1bln. More or less the carrying capacity of a solar-based economy.

The typical normal "human" solution would be to wage endless wars until destruction, famine, disease and despair finally bring death to restore the human-resources equilibrium in the post-fossile fuel era.